le on her face like she wanted them to be friends.
The agent laughed shortly. “No, it’s okay. I see why you stayed here. I had the deputy drop me at the nearby road and then I walked. It’s like an ice forest out there.”
“Oh.” Harper frowned again. “I hate that you had to do that because of me. Thank you for your concern.” She looked at Jak. “But really, I’m just fine.” She smiled at him and then she blushed. Jak looked at the agent, hoping he’d seen it and knew what it meant.
“I’m actually glad I drove out.” He gave Jak a small smile. “Or walked as the case may be. I wanted to talk to you anyway. I’ve found out a few things that I think you should know about. And, I’m hoping you’ll answer a few more questions.”
“Do you want to sit down?” Harper cut in, leading the agent to Jak’s table. He watched them for a minute as Harper pointed to one of the stools, making sure he was comfortable. That’s where Jak had sat with Harper, and he felt something odd bubbling in his chest. No, not bubbling . . . but . . . he hated that he couldn’t even explain to himself how he felt from minute to minute. Maybe if he could explain how he felt, he could talk himself out of it. As it was, all he had were the feelings. Nothing else.
After they’d both sat, Jak walked slowly to the table, joining them. The agent was watching him, the look on his face not mean and Jak stared back. He knew that if another male stared at him, he could not be the first to look away, or it would show fear. The agent knew that too, he could tell.
“Lucas—”
Harper cleared her throat, giving Jak a look.
“Am I missing something here?”
Jak sighed. He had told Harper his name and didn’t want her to have to lie for him. “I lied about my name. My name is Jak. I told the truth when I said I didn’t know my last name.”
The agent tilted his head. “Why did you give me a false name?”
“I didn’t know if I could trust you.” I still don’t.
The man looked at him for a beat, two, but then nodded. “I understand.” Jak watched him, nodded back. “Jak then . . . can you tell me again what you remember about being left out here by your parents?”
“I . . . don’t remember anything, except being alone and having to . . . survive.”
“That’s all? Nothing more? Nothing about . . . being dropped off out here? Nothing before that?”
Jak shook his head, not looking at Harper. He hated lying in front of her. It made him feel bad inside after they’d shared truth, after she’d told him her secrets. He battled inside his own mind, not knowing what to do, trying hard to go through the reasons he should tell the truth, and the reasons he should not.
Agent Gallagher sighed and they were all quiet for a minute, something in the air that made Jak . . . unsure. The older man laced his fingers together, his hands on the table. “Jak, can I tell you why I moved here to Montana? Why I took a new job at fifty-four, instead of staying in California at a job I loved? In the house my wife and I had put so much work into? The place where we’d raised our daughter?”
Jak tried to hide his surprise. He nodded slowly. Harper seemed surprised too as she watched the agent.
Agent Gallagher let out a long, slow breath. “Our only child, Abbi, died of leukemia three years ago. She was twenty years old. She’d been battling the disease since she was seventeen and a senior in high school. We—” His voice broke off then, and Jak could hear the breakable sadness in it, like the distant snap of something in the faraway that you couldn’t name but knew had lost a piece of itself. “We buried her and we tried to find a reason to go on living.” He paused for a long time, looking down at his hands.
Jak noticed Harper had the same look of sadness on her face as Agent Gallagher’s. I understand you, her look said. She was kind. Good. It made Jak feel . . . soft toward her.
“One day my wife and I were in the grocery store and we ran into one of Abbi’s best friends, Ella. We hadn’t seen her since the funeral and . . . well, she was six months pregnant, excited to be expecting her first. We said all the right things, I suppose. Smiled. But . . . it broke us. My wife and I went home and sat there and it was”—he shook his head—“it was like losing her all over again. Losing what would have been. We lived in a tight community. We knew we’d watch—even if from a distance—all of Abbi’s friends get married, have children and it . . . it felt unbearable.”
He looked up at Jak and Harper, giving them a sad smile. “Laurie’s sister lives in Montana and is raising two boys on her own. She’d been a great support to Laurie, and Laurie had been a great support to her when she went through her divorce, but she was far away. I thought I was doing the right thing when I applied to the Montana Department of Justice. I thought . . . a new start is what we needed. Somewhere the memories aren’t crushing at every turn. Somewhere we have family. And”—he took a deep breath—“all that’s been good. But the problem is, we still look at each other and all we see is Abbi. All we see are those hospital rooms, our daughter slipping away, and then that . . . casket.”
He was quiet again and then he looked at Jak. “That’s what brought me to Montana, Jak. I’m here because I was running away, but I didn’t get far enough. I’m here because the thing I loved most in this world, my complete family, is no longer in it, and I can’t make sense of how we’ll ever be happy again. I’m lost, and I think you are too. And I’m not sure what can be done about my own situation, but I hope you’ll let me help you with yours.”
A tear slipped down Harper’s cheek, and she wiped at it quickly.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, and Agent Gallagher nodded, giving her a sad smile.
Jak let out a breath, running a hand over his jaw, still confused, but feeling . . . like he had two people who might . . . who might be on his side. A breeze blew through him, carrying happiness. Fear.
“I woke up at the edge of a cliff. There was a man. He told me it might be the day I would die,” he said, the words tumbling over each other like they’d been a pile of sticks dammed up for a long time and finally been pushed free.
Harper’s eyes went wide and she tilted her head, surprise so clear in her face. He pressed his lips together, not moving his eyes from hers. “But a huge piece of ice moved, making snow slide. I . . . went over.” He looked away. He wouldn’t tell about the other kids. If they knew about them, they’d find out he killed one of them. They’d find out all the other bad things he’d done. And if they found all that out, he’d stay in that tiny cage with the bad smells. He’d die there. Alone.
Harper’s face had lost color and her body was held stiff. “I don’t understand.”
Agent Gallagher gave her a look that Jak didn’t understand. But the words inside him were moving—the dam had broken. He’d never said these words to another living person.